Woodworking blog entries tagged with 'honing'

What is your favorite iron and sharpening method AND why?
After we had a few talks on Berthas ‘what is your favorite hand plane’ blog I decided we needed to go to next step.
So please let us hear your thoughts show us pictures videos why you like your blade or sharpening method and proofs if they exist why it should be better than other.
I am lazy by nature, and handicapped by life, so for me to stand and move the blade forward and backward on a stone or paper is a pa...

so just like every other woodworker at one point (what’s up with the other every other woodworkers is beyond me…) I was researching and learning about ways to sharpen my chisels, planes, and other blade tools in the shop.
Since I am the weekend warrior at this point, and I do not need to resharpen my tools THAT often, nor THAT much, I figure that I can do without any expensive powertools (there are several of those on the market) to sharpen blades and I dont really have the spa...

I recently unpacked a set of 6 small carving tools (no maker’s marks) that I had purchased at a carving show several years ago. These poor little tools had obviously been abused, but I figured that they could be brought back to life with a little care and patience. I really would have had difficulty cutting my finger with them. Here’s what they looked like, complete with fairly coarse grinder marks.
So, the time came to work on these, and all it took was 3 steps.1. I did a fairly ...

I have been fortunate enough to assemble and use an array of handplanes – Stanley Bailey bench, block, and specific use planes, oriental woodies of various sizes, Lee Valley Veritas bevel up and scraper planes, and some other assorted types. It took a while, as in 4-5 years of using, fettling, trying various methods of things and different plane designs to form up some conclusions from my experiences. I thought I would pass along these experiences, primarily with the lesser experienced in min...

“My Journey Towards Proficiency.” That’s a lofty statement, isn’t it? Let’s just say it’s a goal I have the intention of reaching at some level, some day.
There seems to be a lot of chatter about hand tools in the world of woodworking lately and I am glad it is occurring. As most of you probably know, this can be a decidedly partisan discussion. I don’t want to get into that type of discussion because a person’s tool choice really comes down to what makes them happy and gets th...

The Church of ‘Leave me Alone, Please’
By: Christopher Schwarz | May 1, 2014
During the last 17 years that I have been using a honing guide to sharpen, I’ve been approached (sometimes nearly assaulted) by people who want to teach me to sharpen freehand.
My response: “I sharpen freehand all the time.”
They don’t believe me, and so they spend an hour or so to show me how they hone their edges. Then they want me to try their technique and say: “That’s fantastic! I’m throwing away my ...

I love to sharpen my tools with Japanese water stones. It is like meditation. First you choose appropriate stones for a particular blade. Then soak these stones in water for a while. Then level surfaces of the stones. Then pick up one stone and start to sharpen. Thoroughly, thoughtfuly, unhurriedly. Then you take second stone, then third, then fourth… Using nagura… Listening to shamisen… This way inevitably leads to full and ultimate enlightenment. But, to be honest, sometimes I just want to ...

So one of the other projects I wish to accomplish this year (towards spring/summer) is a foot powered grinding wheel.
gives you a vague idea of what I’m going after. The image, btw is from http://autonopedia.org/crafts_and_technology/Wood/Wood_Harvesting_with_Hand_Tools.html which might be of some interest to others.
So the main choice facing me is natural stone, either harvested around me or from a stone yard, or to make a wheel using concrete/abrasive sands, several recipes ...

Cutting edges are supposed to be created by the meeting of two surfaces. Most the stuff on honing I see only addresses refreshing one of those surfaces but both surfaces suffer dulling wear in use. Repeatable, dependable creating of a sharp edge requires addressing both surfaces. Flat stones and a matching flat face on the tool to be honed facilitate quick honing.
This video was created in response to Chris Schwarz’s blog post, Shut up and sharpen. He wanted links to videos posted.
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Last year I acquired this rabbet plane from a computer client. I finally got around to honing the iron and tuning the setup. I ended up eyeballing the iron angle in a Veritas Mk II and came close enough that the new edge would work for this plane. It took a while to get the skew angle eyeballed and locked down. I put an ever-so-slight beveled on the corners.
Wood plane are still a bit of mystery (black art!) to me. It took a lot of fiddling and guess work to figure out how to make the ...